1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a microscope apparatus.
This application is based on Japanese Patent Application No 2009-265065 and No. 2010-167048, the content of which is incorporated herein by reference.
2. Description of Related Art
In a known microscope apparatus in the related art, a specimen is irradiated with stimulus light from a stimulation optical system, and various changes in the specimen due to the stimulation are observed with an observation optical system (for example, see Japanese Unexamined Patent Application, Publication No. 2007-334319, Japanese Unexamined Patent Application, Publication No. 2007-139870, and the Publication of Japanese Patent No. 4084303). In the microscope apparatus disclosed in Japanese Unexamined Patent Application, Publication No. 2007-334319, point stimulation and area stimulation are both possible by changing the numerical aperture of the stimulus light focused at the pupil plane of an objective lens, and stimulation of a wide area on a specimen is possible by scanning the stimulus light by using a scanning optical system. In the microscope apparatus disclosed in Japanese Unexamined Patent Application, Publication No. 2007-139870, a lamp light source that can irradiate a wide area with stimulus light is provided so that a wide area of a specimen can be optically stimulated all at once without scanning the stimulus light. In the microscope apparatus disclosed in the Publication of Japanese Patent No. 4084303, a DMD (digital micromirror device, microdeflection element array) is used in an illumination device so that a desired region at any position on the specimen can be irradiated with stimulus light.
With the microscope apparatus disclosed in Japanese Unexamined Patent Application, Publication No. 2007-334319, a time lag occurs at the start of scanning and the end of scanning when scanning a wide area of the specimen by using the scanning optical system, and in some cases it may not be possible to perform stimulation simultaneously within the same area. With the microscope apparatus disclosed in Japanese Unexamined Patent Application, Publication No. 2007-139870, it is not possible to change the area to be stimulated according to the shape of the specimen, nor to stimulate a plurality of positions simultaneously. With the microscope apparatus disclosed in the Publication of Japanese Patent No. 4084303, the power of the stimulus light is low, and it is not possible to stimulate a specimen with sufficient intensity in applications where a specimen is stimulated with an intense spot.